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LOS  ANCEIE8 


The  Majesty  of  Calmness 


UJTIV.   OF  CALIF.   LIBRARY,  LOS  AUGELES 


RIGHT  LIVING  SERIES 


A  handsome  new,  up-to-date  series  of 
•**•  booklets  unique  in  style  and  treat- 
ment Handsomely  decorated  bindings, 
illuminated  cathedral  glass  decoration, 
dainty  trellis-work  effect,  etc. 

The  Kingship  of  Self  Control 
WILLIAM  GEORGE  JORDAN 

The  Majesty  of  Calmness 

WILLIAM  GEORGE  JORDAN 

Right  Living  as  a  Fine  Art 

NEWELL  DWIGHT  HILLIS 

The  Master  of  Science  of 
Right  Living 

NEWELL  DWIGHT  HILLIS 

The  Gentle  Art  of  Making 

Happy  G.  H.  MORRISON 

The  Dream  of  Youth 

HUGH  BLACK 

The  Friendly  Life 

HENRY  F.  COPE 


THE 


Majesty   of  Calmness 

Individual  Problems 
and  Possibilities  . 


BY 


William   George  Jordan 

Author  of  "The  Kingship  of  Self-Control 


NEW  YORK       CHICAGO       TORONTO 

Fleming  H.  Revell  Company 


and  LONDON 


Republished  from  the  Saturday  Evening  Post  through  the 
courtesy  of  the  Curtis  Publishing  Company. 


Copyrignt,  1898  and  1899 

ty 

CURTIS  PUBLISHING  COMPANY 

Copyright,  1900 

by 

FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 

Entered  at  Stationers'  Haft 


Contents 

"MAP.  PAGE 

I.  THE  MAJESTY  OF  CALMNESS          .  .      7 

II.  HURRY,  THE  SCOURGE  OF  AMERICA  .     12 

III.  THE  POWER  OF  PERSONAL  INFLUENCE  .     18 

IV.  THE  DIGNITY  OF  SELF-RELIANCE    .  .    24 

V.  FAILURE  AS  A  SUCCESS  .        .        .  .31 

VI.  DOING  OUR  BEST  AT  ALL  TIMES  .  .    38 
VII.  THE  ROYAL  ROAD  TO  HAPPINESS  .    47 


2130751 


The  Majesty  of  Calmness 


ALMNESS  is  the  rarest  quality  in  human 
life.  It  is  the  poise  of  a  great  nature, 
in  harmony  with  itself  and  its  ideals. 
It  is  the  moral  atmosphere  of  a  life  self- 
centred,  self-reliant,  and  self-controlled.  Calm- 
ness is  singleness  of  purpose,  absolute  confidence, 
and  conscious  power, — ready  to  be  focused  in  an 
instant  to  meet  any  crisis. 

The  Sphinx  is  not  a  true  type  of  calmness, — 
petrifaction  is  not  calmness;  it  is  death,  the 
silencing  of  all  the  energies ;  while  no  one  lives 
his  life  more  fully,  more  intensely  and  more  con- 
sciously than  the  man  who  is  calm. 

The  Fatalist  is  not  calm.  He  is  the  coward 
slave  of  his  environment,  hopelessly  surrender- 
ing to  his  present  condition,  recklessly  indifferent 
to  his  future.  He  accepts  his  life  as  a  rudderless 
ship,  drifting  on  the  ocean  of  time.  He  has  no 
compass,  no  chart,  no  known  port  to  which  he 
is  sailing.  His  self-confessed  inferiority  to  all 
nature  is  shown  in  his  existence  of  constant  sur- 
render. It  is  not, — calmness. 

The  man  who  is  calm  has  his  course  in  life 
clearly  marked  on  his  chart.  His  hand  is  ever  on 

7 


8  The  Majesty  of  Calmness 

the  helm.  Storm,  fog,  night,  tempest,  danger, 
hidden  reefs, — he  is  ever  prepared  and  ready  for 
them.  He  is  made  calm  and  serene  by  the  reali- 
zation that  in  these  crises  of  his  voyage  he  needs 
a  clear  mind  and  a  cool  head;  that  he  has  naught 
to  do  but  to  do  each  day  the  best  he  can  by  the 
light  he  has;  that  he  will  never  flinch  nor  falter  for 
a  moment;  that,  though  he  may  have  to  tack  and 
leave  his  course  for  a  time,  he  will  never  drift, 
he  will  get  back  into  the  true  channel,  he  will  keep 
ever  headed  toward  his  harbor.  When  he  will 
reach  it,  how  he  will  reach  it,  matters  not  to  him. 
He  rests  in  calmness,  knowing  he  has  done  his 
best.  If  his  best  seem  to  be  overthrown  or  over- 
ruled, then  he  must  still  bow  his  head, — in  calm- 
ness. To  no  man  is  permitted  to  know  the  future 
of  his  life,  the  finality.  God  commits  to  man 
ever  only  new  beginnings,  new  wisdom,  and  new 
days  to  use  the  best  of  his  knowledge. 

Calmness  comes  ever  from  within.  It  is  the 
peace  and  restfulness  of  the  depths  of  our  nature. 
The  fury  of  storm  and  of  wind  agitate  only 
the  surface  of  the  sea ;  they  can  penetrate  only 
two  or  three  hundred  feet, — below  that  is  the 
calm,  unruffled  deep.  To  be  ready  for  the  great 
crises  of  life  we  must  learn  serenity  in  our  daily 
living.  Calmness  is  the  crown  of  self-control. 

When  the  worries  and  cares  of  the  day  fret 
you,  and  begin  to  wear  upon  you,  and  you  chafe 
under  the  friction, — be  calm.  Stop,  rest  for  a 
moment,  and  let  calmness  and  peace  assert  them- 
selves. If  you  let  these  irritating  outside  influ- 


The  Majesty  of  Calmness  9 

ences  get  the  better  of  you,  you  are  confessing 
your  inferiority  to  them,  by  permitting  them  to 
dominate  you.  Study  the  disturbing  elements, 
each  by  itself,  bring  all  the  will  power  of  your 
nature  to  bear  upon  them,  and  you  will  find  that 
they  will,  one  by  one,  melt  into  nothingness,  like 
vapors  fading  before  the  sun.  The  glow  of 
calmness  that  will  then  pervade  your  mind,  the 
tingling  sensation  of  an  inflow  of  new  strength, 
may  be  to  you  the  beginning  of  the  revelation  of 
the  supreme  calmness  that  is  possible  for  you. 
Then,  in  some  great  hour  of  your  life,  when  you 
stand  face  to  face  with  some  awful  trial,  when 
the  structure  of  your  ambition  and  life-work 
crumbles  in  a  moment,  you  will  be  brave.  You 
can  then  fold  your  arms  calmly,  look  out  undis- 
mayed and  undaunted  upon  the  ashes  of  your 
hope,  upon  the  wreck  of  what  you  have  faith- 
fully built,  and  with  brave  heart  and  unfaltering 
voice  you  may  say:  "So  let  it  be,— I  will  build 
•again." 

When  the  tongue  of  malice  and  slander,  the 
persecution  of  inferiority,  tempts  you  for  just  a 
moment  to  retaliate,  when  for  an  instant  you  for- 
get yourself  so  far  as  to  hunger  for  revenge, — be 
calm.  When  the  grey  heron  is  pursued  by  its 
enemy,  the  eagle,  it  does  not  run  to  escape  ;  it 
remains  calm,  takes  a  dignified  stand,  and  waits 
quietly,  facing  the  enemy  unmoved.  With  the 
terrific  force  with  which  the  eagle  makes  its  at- 
tack, the  boasted  king  of  birds  is  often  impaled 
and  run  through  on  the  quiet,  lance-like  bill  of  the 


lo  The  Majesty  of  Calmness 

heron.  The  means  that  man  takes  to  kill  an- 
other's character  becomes  suicide  of  his  own. 

No  man  in  the  world  ever  attempted  to  wrong 
another  without  being  injured  in  return,— some- 
way, somehow,  sometime.  The  only  weapon  of 
offence  that  Nature  seems  to  recognize  is  the 
boomerang.  Nature  keeps  her  books  admirably; 
she  puts  down  every  item,  she  closes  all  accounts 
finally,  but  she  does  not  always  balance  them 
at  the  end  of  the  month.  To  the  man  who  is 
calm,  revenge  is  so  far  beneath  him  that  he  can- 
not reach  it, — even  by  stooping.  When  injured, 
he  does  not  retaliate;  he  wraps  around  him  the 
royal  robes  of  Calmness,  and  he  goes  quietly  on 
his  way. 

When  the  hand  of  Death  touches  the  one  we 
hold  dearest,  paralyzes  our  energy,  and  eclipses 
the  sun  of  our  life,  the  calmness  that  has  been 
accumulating  in  long  years  becomes  in  a  moment 
our  refuge,  our  reserve  strength. 

The  most  subtle  of  all  temptations  is  the  seem- 
ing success  of  the  wicked.  It  requires  moral 
courage  to  see,  without  flinching,  material  pros- 
perity coming  to  men  who  are  dishonest;  to  see 
politicians  rise  into  prominence,  power  and 
wealth  by  trickery  and  corruption ;  to  see  virtue  in 
rags  and  vice  in  velvets;  to  see  ignorance  at  a 
premium,  and  knowledge  at  a  discount.  To  the 
man  who  is  really  calm  these  puzzles  of  life  do  not 
appeal.  He  is  living  his  life  as  best  he  can;  he  is 
not  worrying  about  the  problems  of  justice,  whose 
solution  must  be  left  to  Omniscience  to  solve. 


The  Majesty  of  Calmness  1 1 

When  man  has  developed  the  spirit  of  Calmness 
until  it  becomes  so  absolutely  part  of  him  that 
his  very  presence  radiates  it,  he  has  made  great 
progress  in  life.  Calmness  cannot  be  acquired  of 
itself  and  by  itself;  it  must  come  as  the  culmina- 
tion of  a  series  of  virtues.  What  the  world  needs 
and  what  individuals  need  is  a  higher  standard  of 
living,  a  great  realizing  sense  of  the  privilege  and 
dignity  of  life,  a  higher  and  nobler  conception  of 
individuality. 

With  this  great  sense  of  calmness  permeating 
an  individual,  man  becomes  able  to  retire  more 
into  himself,  away  from  the  noise,  the  confusion 
and  strife  of  the  world,  which  come  to  his  ears 
only  as  faint,  far-off  rumblings,  or  as  the  tumult 
of  the  life  of  a  city  heard  only  as  a  buzzing  hum 
by  the  man  in  a  balloon. 

The  man  who  is  calm  does  not  selfishly  isolate 
himself  from  the  world,  for  he  is  intensely  in- 
terested in  all  that  concerns  the  welfare  of  hu- 
manity. His  calmness  is  but  a  Holy  of  Holies 
into  which  he  can  retire  from  the  world  to  get 
strength  to  live  in  the  world.  He  realizes  that 
the  full  glory  of  individuality,  the  crowning  of 
his  self-control  is, — the  majesty  of  calmness. 


I 
Hurry,  the  Scourge  of  America 

j|HE  first  sermon  in  the  world  was  preached 
at  the  Creation.  It  was  a  Divine  protest 
against  Hurry.  It  was  a  Divine  object 
lesson  of  perfect  law,  perfect  plan,  per- 
fect order,  perfect  method.  Six  days  of  work 
carefully  planned,  scheduled  and  completed  were 
followed  by, — rest.  Whether  we  accept  the  story 
as  literal  or  as  figurative,  as  the  account  of  suc- 
cessive days  or  of  ages  comprising  millions  of 
years,  matters  little  if  we  but  learn  the  lesson. 

Nature  is  very  un-American.  Nature  never 
hurries.  Every  phase  of  her  working  shows 
plan,  calmness,  reliability,  and  the  absence  of 
hurry.  Hurry  always  implies  lack  of  definite 
method,  confusion,  impatience  of  slow  growth. 
The  Tower  of  Babel,  the  world's  first  sky- 
scraper, was  a  failure  because  of  hurry.  The 
workers  mistook  their  arrogant  ambition  for  in- 
spiration. They  had  too  many  builders, — and  no 
architect.  They  thought  to  make  up  the  lack  of 
a  head  by  a  superfluity  of  hands.  This  is  a  char- 
acteristic of  Hurry.  It  seeks  ever  to  make  energy 
a  substitute  for  a  clearly  defined  plan,— the  result  is 
ever  as  hopeless  as  trying  to  transform  a  hobby- 
horse into  a  real  steed  by  brisk  riding. 

12 


Hurry,  the  Scourge  of  America      13 

Hurry  is  a  counterfeit  of  haste.  Haste  has  an 
ideal,  a  distinct  aim  to  be  realized  by  the  quick- 
est, direct  methods.  Haste  has  a  single  compass 
upon  which  it  relies  for  direction  and  in  harmony 
with  which  its  course  is  determined.  Hurry 
says  :  "  I  must  move  faster.  I  will  get  three 
compasses;  I  will  have  them  different;  I  will  be 
guided  by  all  of  them.  One  of  them  will  prob- 
ably be  right."  Hurry  never  realizes  that  slow, 
careful  foundation  work  is  the  quickest  in  the 
end. 

Hurry  has  ruined  more  Americans  than  has  any 
other  word  in  the  vocabulary  of  life.  It  is  the 
scourge  of  America;  and  is  both  a  cause  and  a 
result  of  our  high-pressure  civilization.  Hurry 
adroitly  assumes  so  many  masquerades  of  dis- 
guise that  its  identity  is  not  always  recognized. 

Hurry  always  pays  the  highest  price  for  every- 
thing, and,  usually  the  goods  are  not  delivered.  In 
the  race  for  wealth  men  often  sacrifice  time, 
energy,  health,  home,  happiness  and  honor, — 
everything  that  money  cannot  buy,  the  very 
things  that  money  can  never  bring  back.  Hurry 
is  a  phantom  of  paradoxes.  Business  men,  in 
their  desire  to  provide  for  the  future  happiness  of 
their  family,  often  sacrifice  the  present  happiness 
of  wife  and  children  on  the  altar  of  Hurry.  They 
forget  that  their  place  in  the  home  should  be  some- 
thing greater  than  being  merely  "the  man  that 
pays  the  bills;"  they  expect  consideration  and 
thoughtfulness  that  they  are  not  giving. 

We  hear  too  much  of  a  wife's  duties  to  a  hus- 


14     Hurry,  the  Scourge  of  America 

band  and  too  little  of  the  other  side  of  the  ques- 
tion. "The  wife, "they  tell  us,  "should  meet  her 
husband  with  a  smile  and  a  kiss,  should  tactfully 
watch  his  moods  and  be  ever  sweetness  and  sun- 
shine." Why  this  continual  swinging  of  the 
censer  of  devotion  to  the  man  of  business? 
Why  should  a  woman  have  to  look  up  with 
timid  glance  at  the  face  of  her  husband,  to  "  size 
up  his  mood  "  ?  Has  not  her  day,  too,  been  one 
of  care,  and  responsibility,  and  watchfulness  ? 
Has  not  mother-love  been  working  over  perplex- 
ing problems  and  worries  of  home  and  of  the 
training  of  the  children  that  wifely  love  may 
make  her  seek  to  solve  in  secret  ?  Is  man,  then, 
the  weaker  sex  that  he  must  be  pampered  and 
treated  as  tenderly  as  a  boil  trying  to  keep  from 
contact  with  the  world  ? 

In  their  hurry  to  attain  some  ambition,  to 
gratify  the  dream  of  a  life,  men  often  throw  honor, 
truth,  and  generosity  to  the  winds.  Politicians 
dare  to  stand  by  and  see  a  city  poisoned  with 
foul  water  until  they  "see  where  they  come  in  " 
on  a  water-works  appropriation.  If  it  be  neces- 
sary to  poison  an  army, — that,  too,  is  but  an  in- 
cident in  the  hurry  for  wealth. 

This  is  the  Age  of  the  Hothouse.  The  element 
of  natural  growth  is  pushed  to  one  side  and  the 
hothouse  and  the  force-pump  are  substituted. 
Nature  looks  on  tolerantly  as  she  says  :  "So  far 
you  may  go,  but  no  farther,  my  foolish  children." 

The  educational  system  of  to-day  is  a  monu- 
mental institution  dedicated  to  Hurry.  The  chil- 


Hurry,  the  Scourge  of  America      15 

dren  are  forced  to  go  through  a  series  of  studies 
that  sweep  the  circle  of  all  human  wisdom. 
They  are  given  everything  that  the  ambitious 
ignorance  of  the  age  can  force  into  their  minds; 
they  are  taught  everything  but  the  essentials, — 
how  to  use  their  senses  and  how  to  think.  Their 
minds  become  congested  by  a  great  mass  of 
undigested  facts,  and  still  the  cruel,  barbarous 
forcing  goes  on.  You  watch  it  until  it  seems 
you  cannot  stand  it  a  moment  longer,  and  you 
instinctively  put  out  your  hand  and  say :  "  Stop  ! 
This  modern  slaughter  of  the  Innocents  must  not 
go  on!"  Education  smiles  suavely,  waves  her 
hand  complacently  toward  her  thousands  of 
knowledge-prisons  over  the  country,  and  says: 
"  Who  are  you  that  dares  speak  a  word  against 
our  sacred,  school  system?"  Education  is  in  a 
hurry.  Because  she  fails  in  fifteen  years  to  do 
what  half  the  time  should  accomplish  by  better 
methods,  she  should  not  be  too  boastful.  In- 
competence is  not  always  a  reason  for  pride. 
And  they  hurry  the  children  into  a  hundred  text- 
books, then  into  ill-health,  then  into  the  colleges, 
then  into  a  diploma,  then  into  life, — with  a  dazed 
mind,  untrained  and  unfitted  for  the  real  duties  of 
living. 

Hurry  is  the  deathblow  to  calmness,  to  dignity, 
to  poise.  The  old-time  courtesy  went  out  when 
the  new-time  hurry  came  in.  Hurry  is  the  father 
of  dyspepsia.  In  the  rush  of  our  national  life,  the 
bolting  of  food  has  become  a  national  vice.  The 
words  "Quick  Lunches"  might  properly  be 


16     Hurry,  the  Scourge  of  America 

placed  on  thousands  of  headstones  in  our  ceme- 
teries. Man  forgets  that  he  is  the  only  animal 
that  dines;  the  others  merely  feed.  Why  does 
he  abrogate  his  right  to  dine  and  go  to  the  end 
of  the  line  with  the  mere  feeders  ?  His  self-re- 
specting stomach  rebels,  and  expresses  its  indig- 
nation by  indigestion.  Then  man  has  to  go 
through  life  with  a  little  bottle  of  pepsin  tablets 
in  his  vest-pocket.  He  is  but  another  victim  to 
this  craze  for  speed.  Hurry  means  the  break- 
down of  the  nerves.  It  is  the  royal  road  to 
nervous  prostration. 

Everything  that  is  great  in  life  is  the  product 
of  slow  growth;  the  newer,  and  greater,  and 
higher,  and  nobler  the  work,  the  slower  is  its 
growth,  the  surer  is  its  lasting  success.  Mush- 
rooms attain  their  full  power  in  a  night;  oaks  re- 
quire decades.  A  fad  lives  its  life  in  a  few 
weeks;  a  philosophy  lives  through  generations 
and  centuries.  If  you  are  sure  you  are  right,  do 
not  let  the  voice  of  the  world,  or  of  friends,  or  of 
family  swerve  you  for  a  moment  from  your  pur- 
pose. Accept  slow  growth  if  it  must  be  slow,  and 
know  the  results  must  come,  as  you  would  accept 
the  long,  lonely  hours  of  the  night, — with  absolute 
assurance  that  the  heavy-leaded  moments  must 
bring  the  morning. 

Let  us  as  individuals  banish  the  word  "  Hurry  * 
from  our  lives.  Let  us  care  for  nothing  so  much 
that  we  would  pay  honor  and  self-respect  as  the 
price  of  hurrying  it.  Let  us  cultivate  calmness, 
restfulness,  poise,  sweetness,— doing  our  best 


Hurry,  the  Scourge  of  America      17 

bearing  all  things  as  bravely  as  we  can ;  living  our 
life  undisturbed  by  the  prosperity  of  the  wicked  or 
the  malice  of  the  envious.  Let  us  not  be  impatient, 
chafing  at  delay,  fretting  over  failure,  wearying 
over  results,  and  weakening  under  opposition. 
Let  us  ever  turn  our  face  toward  the  future  with 
confidence  and  trust,  with  the  calmness  of  a  life 
in  harmony  with  itself,  true  to  its  ideals,  and 
slowly  and  constantly  progressing  toward  their 
realization. 

Let  us  see  that  cowardly  word  Hurry  in  all  its 
most  degenerating  phases,  let  us  see  that  it  ever 
kills  truth,  loyalty,  thoroughness;  and  let  us  de- 
termine that,  day  by  day,  we  will  seek  more  and 
more  to  substitute  for  it  the  calmness  and  repose 
of  a  true  life,  nobly  lived. 


Hi 

The  Power  of  Personal  Influence 


HE  only  responsibility  that  a  man  cannot 
evade  in  this  life  is  the  one  he  thinks 
of  least, — his  personal  influence.  Man's 
conscious  influence,  when  he  is  on 
dress-parade,  when  he  is  posing  to  impress  those 
around  him, — is  woefully  small.  But  his  uncon- 
scious influence,  the  silent,  subtle  radiation  of 
his  personality,  the  effect  of  his  words  and  acts, 
the  trifles  he  never  considers, — is  tremendous. 
Every  moment  of  life  he  is  changing  to  a  degree 
the  life  of  the  whole  world.  Every  man  has  an 
atmosphere  which  is  affecting  every  other.  So 
silent  and  unconsciously  is  this  influence  work- 
ing, that  man  may  forget  that  it  exists. 

All  the  forces  of  Nature, — heat,  light,  elec- 
tricity and  gravitation, — are  silent  and  invisible. 
We  never  see  them;  we  only  know  that  they 
exist  by  seeing  the  effects  they  produce.  In  all 
Nature  the  wonders  of  the  "seen"  are  dwarfed 
into  insignificance  when  compared  with  the 
majesty  and  glory  of  the  "unseen."  The  great 
sun  itself  does  not  supply  enough  heat  and  light 
to  sustain  animal  and  vegetable  life  on  the  earth. 
We  are  dependent  for  nearly  half  of  our  light 
heat  upon  the  stars,  and  the  greater  part  of 


The  Power  of  Personal  Influence    19 

this  supply  of  life-giving  energy  comes  from  in- 
visible stars,  millions  of  miles  from  the  earth. 
In  a  thousand  ways  Nature  constantly  seeks  to 
lead  men  to  a  keener  and  deeper  realization  of 
the  power  and  the  wonder  of  the  invisible. 

Into  the  hands  of  every  individual  is  given  a 
marvellous  power  for  good  or  for  evil,— the 
silent,  unconscious,  unseen  influence  of  his  life. 
This  is  simply  the  constant  radiation  of  what 
a  man  really  is,  not  what  he  pretends  to  be. 
Every  man,  by  his  mere  living,  is  radiating  sym- 
pathy, or  sorrow,  or  morbidness,  or  cynicism,  or 
happiness,  or  hope,  or  any  of  a  hundred  other 
qualities.  Life  is  a  state  of  constant  radiation 
and  absorption;  to  exist  is  to  radiate;  to  exist  is 
to  be  the  recipient  of  radiations. 

There  are  men  and  women  whose  presence 
seems  to  radiate  sunshine,  cheer  and  optimism. 
You  feel  calmed  and  rested  and  restored  in  a 
moment  to  a  new  and  stronger  faith  in  humanity. 
There  are  others  who  focus  in  an  instant  all  your 
latent  distrust,  morbidness  and  rebellion  against 
life.  Without  knowing  why,  you  chafe  and  fret 
in  their  presence.  You  lose  your  bearings  on  life 
and  its  problems.  Your  moral  compass  is  dis- 
turbed and  unsatisfactory.  It  is  made  untrue  in 
an  instant,  as  the  magnetic  needle  of  a  ship  is 
deflected  when  it  passes  near  great  mountains  of 
iron  ore. 

There  are  men  who  float  down  the  stream  of 
life  like  icebergs, — cold,  reserved,  unapproach- 
able and  self-contained.  In  their  presence  you 


2o    The  Power  of  Personal  Influence 

involuntarily  draw  your  wraps  closer  around 
you,  as  you  wonder  who  left  the  door  open. 
These  refrigerated  human  beings  have  a  most 
depressing  influence  on  all  those  who  fall  under 
the  spell  of  their  radiated  chilliness.  But  there 
are  other  natures,  warm,  helpful,  genial,  who 
are  like  the  Gulf  Stream,  following  their  own 
course,  flowing  undaunted  and  undismayed  in 
the  ocean  of  colder  waters.  Their  presence 
brings  warmth  and  life  and  the  glow  of  sun- 
shine, the  joyous,  stimulating  breath  of  spring. 

There  are  men  who  are  like  malarious  swamps, 
— poisonous,  depressing  and  weakening  by  their 
very  presence.  They  make  heavy,  oppressive  and 
gloomy  the  atmosphere  of  their  own  homes;  the 
sound  of  the  children's  play  is  stilled,  the  ripples 
of  laughter  are  frozen  by  their  presence.  They 
go  through  life  as  if  each  day  were  a  new  big 
funeral,  and  they  were  always  chief  mourners. 
There  are  other  men  who  seem  like  the  ocean; 
they  are  constantly  bracing,  stimulating,  giving 
new  draughts  of  tonic  life  and  strength  by  their 
very  presence. 

There  are  men  who  are  insincere  in  heart,  and 
that  insincerity  is  radiated  by  their  presence. 
They  have  a  wondrous  interest  in  your  welfare, 
— when  they  need  you.  They  put  on  a  "  prop- 
erty" smile  so  suddenly,  when  it  serves  their 
purpose,  that  it  seems  the  smile  must  be  con- 
nected with  some  electric  button  concealed  in 
their  clothes.  Their  voice  has  a  simulated  cor- 
diality that  long  training  may  have  made  almost 


The  Power  of  Personal  Influence    21 

natural.  But  they  never  play  their  part  abso- 
lutely true,  the  mask  will  slip  down  sometimes; 
their  cleverness  cannot  teach  their  eyes  the  look 
of  sterling  honesty;  they  may  deceive  some 
people,  but  they  cannot  deceive  all.  There  is 
a  subtle  power  of  revelation  which  makes  us 
say:  "Well,  I  cannot  explain  how  it  is,  but  I 
know  that  man  is  not  honest." 

Man  cannot  escape  for  one  moment  from  this 
radiation  of  his  character,  this  constantly  weak- 
ening or  strengthening  of  others.  He  cannot 
evade  the  responsibility  by  saying  it  is  an  uncon- 
scious influence.  He  can  select  the  qualities  that 
he  will  permit  to  be  radiated.  He  can  cultivate 
sweetness,  calmness,  trust,  generosity,  truth,  jus- 
tice, loyalty,  nobility, — make  them  vitally  active 
in  his  character, — and  by  these  qualities  he  will 
constantly  affect  the  world. 

Discouragement  often  comes  to  honest  souls 
trying  to  live  the  best  they  can,  in  the  thought 
that  they  are  doing  so  little  good  in  the  world. 
Trifles  unnoted  by  us  may  be  links  in  the  chain 
of  some  great  purpose.  In  1797,  William  Godwin 
wrote  The  Inquirer,  a  collection  of  revolutionary 
essays  on  morals  and  politics.  This  book  in- 
fluenced Thomas  Malthus  to  write  his  Essay  on 
Population,  published  in  1798.  Malthus'  book 
suggested  to  Charles  Darwin  a  point  of  view 
upon  which  he  devoted  many  years  of  his  life, 
resulting,  in  1859,  in  the  publication  of  The 
Origin  of  Species, — the  most  influential  book  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  a  book  that  has  revolu- 


22    The  Power  of  Personal  Influence 

tionized  all  science.  These  were  but  three  links 
of  influence  extending  over  sixty  years.  It  might 
be  possible  to  trace  this  genealogy  of  influence 
back  from  Godwin,  through  generation  and  gen- 
eration, to  the  word  or  act  of  some  shepherd  in 
early  Britain,  watching  his  flock  upon  the  hills, 
living  his  quiet  life,  and  dying  with  the  thought 
that  he  had  done  nothing  to  help  the  world. 

Men  and  women  have  duties  to  others, — and 
duties  to  themselves.  In  justice  to  ourselves  we 
should  refuse  to  live  in  an  atmosphere  that  keeps 
us  from  living  our  best.  If  the  fault  be  in  us, 
we  should  master  it.  If  it  be  the  personal  in- 
fluence of  others  that,  like  a  noxious  vapor,  kills 
our  best  impulses,  we  should  remove  from  that 
influence, — if  we  can  possibly  move  without  for- 
saking duties.  If  it  be  wrong  to  move,  then  we 
should  take  strong  doses  of  moral  quinine  to 
counteract  the  malaria  of  influence.  It  is  not 
what  those  around  us  do  for  us  that  counts, — it 
is  what  they  are  to  us.  We  carry  our  house- 
plants  from  one  window  to  another  to  give  them 
the  proper  heat,  light,  air  and  moisture.  Should 
we  not  be  at  least  as  careful  of  ourselves  ? 

To  make  our  influence  felt  we  must  live  our 
faith,  we  must  practice  what  we  believe.  A 
magnet  does  not  attract  iron,  as  iron.  It  must 
first  convert  the  iron  into  another  magnet  before 
it  can  attract  it.  It  is  useless  for  a  parent  to  try 
to  teach  gentleness  to  her  children  when  she  her- 
self is  cross  and  irritable.  The  child  who  is  told 
to  be  truthful  and  who  hears  a  parent  lie  cleverly 


The  Power  of  Personal  Influence    23 

to  escape  some  little  social  unpleasantness  is 
not  going  to  cling  very  zealously  to  truth.  The 
parent's  words  say  "don't  lie,"  the  influence  of 
the  parent's  life  says  "do  lie." 

No  man  can  ever  isolate  himself  to  evade  this 
constant  power  of  influence,  as  no  single  cor- 
puscle can  rebel  and  escape  from  the  general 
course  of  the  blood.  No  individual  is  so  insig- 
nificant as  to  be  without  influence.  The  changes 
in  our  varying  moods  are  all  recorded  in  the  deli- 
cate barometers  of  the  lives  of  others.  We  should 
ever  let  our  influence  filter  through  human  love 
and  sympathy.  We  should  not  be  merely  an  in- 
fluence,— we  should  be  an  inspiration.  By  our 
very  presence  we  should  be  a  tower  of  strength 
to  the  hungering  human  souls  around  us. 


IV 
The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance 


ELF-CONFIDENCE,  without  self-reliance, 
is  as  useless  as  a  cooking  recipe, — with- 
out food.  Self-confidence  sees  the  pos- 
sibilities of  the  individual;  self-reliance 
realizes  them.  Self-confidence  sees  the  angel  in 
the  unhewn  block  of  marble;  self-reliance  carves 
it  out  for  himself. 

The  man  who  is  self-reliant  says  ever:  "No 
one  can  realize  my  possibilities  for  me,  but  me; 
no  one  can  make  me  good  or  evil  but  myself." 
He  works  out  his  own  salvation, — financially, 
socially,  mentally,  physically,  and  morally.  Life 
is  an  individual  problem  that  man  must  solve  for 
himself.  Nature  accepts  no  vicarious  sacrifice, 
no  vicarious  service.  Nature  never  recognizes  a 
proxy  vote.  She  has  nothing  to  do  with  middle- 
men,— she  deals  only  with  the  individual.  Na- 
ture is  constantly  seeking  to  show  man  that  he  is 
his  own  best  friend,  or  his  own  worst  enemy. 
Nature  gives  man  the  option  on  which  he  will  be 
to  himself. 

All  the  athletic  exercises  in  the  world  are  of  no 
value  to  the  individual  unless  he  compel  those 
bars  and  dumb-bells  to  yield  to  him,  in  strength 
and  muscle,  the  power  for  which  he,  himself, 

24 


The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance        25 

pays  in  time  and  effort.  He  can  never  develop  his 
muscles  by  sending  his  valet  to  a  gymnasium. 

The  medicine-chests  of  the  world  are  powerless, 
in  all  the  united  efforts,  to  help  the  individual 
until  he  reach  out  and  take  for  himself  what  is 
needed  for  his  individual  weakness. 

All  the  religions  of  the  world  are  but  specu- 
lations in  morals,  mere  theories  of  salvation,  un- 
til the  individual  realize  that  he  must  save  him- 
self by  relying  on  the  law  of  truth,  as  he  sees  it, 
and  living  his  life  in  harmony  with  it,  as  fully  as 
he  can.  But  religion  is  not  a  Pullman  car,  with 
soft-cushioned  seats,  where  he  has  but  to  pay  for 
his  ticket, — and  some  one  else  does  all  the  rest.  In 
religion,  as  in  all  other  great  things,  he  is  ever 
thrown  back  on  his  self-reliance.  He  should  ac- 
cept all  helps,  but, — he  must  live  his  own  life. 
He  should  not  feel  that  he  is  a  mere  passenger; 
he  is  the  engineer,  and  the  train  is  his  life.  We 
must  rely  on  ourselves,  live  our  own  lives,  or  we 
merely  drift  through  existence, — losing  all  that 
is  best,  all  that  is  greatest,  all  that  is  divine. 

All  that  others  can  do  for  us  is  to  give  us  op- 
portunity. We  must  ever  be  prepared  for  the 
opportunity  when  it  comes,  and  to  go  after  it 
and  find  it  when  it  does  not  come,  or  that  op- 
portunity is  to  us, — nothing.  Life  is  but  a  suc- 
cession of  opportunities.  They  are  for  good  or 
evil, — as  we  make  them. 

Many  of  the  alchemists  of  old  felt  that  they 
lacked  but  one  element;  if  they  could  obtain 
that  one,  they  believed  they  could  transmute 


26        The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance 

the  baser  metals  into  pure  gold.  It  is  so  in  char- 
acter. There  are  individuals  with  rare  mental 
gifts,  and  delicate  spiritual  discernment  who  fail 
utterly  in  life  because  they  lack  the  one  element, 
— self-reliance.  This  would  unite  all  their  ener- 
gies, and  focus  them  into  strength  and  power. 

The  man  who  is  not  self-reliant  is  weak,  hesi- 
tating and  doubting  in  all  he  does.  He  fears  to 
take  a  decisive  step,  because  he  dreads  failure, 
because  he  is  waiting  for  some  one  to  advise  him 
or  because  he  dare  not  act  in  accordance  with  his 
own  best  judgment.  In  his  cowardice  and  his 
conceit  he  sees  all  his  non-success  due  to  others. 
He  is  "not  appreciated,"  "not  recognized,"  he 
is  "  kept  down."  He  feels  that  in  some  subtle  way 
"  society  is  conspiring  against  him."  He  grows 
almost  vain  as  he  thinks  that  no  one  has  had 
such  poverty,  such  sorrow,  such  affliction,  such 
failure  as  have  come  to  him. 

The  man  who  is  self-reliant  seeks  ever  to  dis- 
cover and  conquer  the  weakness  within  him  that 
keeps  him  from  the  attainment  of  what  he  holds 
dearest;  he  seeks  within  himself  the  power  to 
battle  against  all  outside  influences.  He  realizes 
that  all  the  greatest  men  in  history,  in  every  phase 
of  human  effort,  have  been  those  who  have  had 
to  fight  against  the  odds  of  sickness,  suffering, 
sorrow.  To  him,  defeat  is  no  more  than  passing 
through  a  tunnel  is  to  a  traveller,— he  knows  he 
must  emerge  again  into  the  sunlight. 

The  nation  that  is  strongest  is  the  one  that  is 
most  self-reliant,  the  one  that  contains  within  its 


The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance        27 

boundaries  all  that  its  people  need.  If,  with  its 
ports  all  blockaded  it  has  not  within  itself  the 
necessities  of  life  and  the  elements  of  its  contin- 
ual progress  then, — it  is  weak,  held  by  the 
enemy,  and  it  is  but  a  question  of  time  till  it 
must  surrender.  Its  independence  is  in  proportion 
to  its  self-reliance,  to  its  power  to  sustain  itself 
from  within.  What  is  true  of  nations  is  true  of 
individuals.  The  history  of  nations  is  but  the 
biography  of  individuals  magnified,  intensified, 
multiplied,  and  projected  on  the  screen  of  the 
past.  History  is  the  biography  of  a  nation ;  biog- 
raphy is  the  history  of  an  individual.  So  it  must 
be  that  the  individual  who  is  most  strong  in  any 
trial,  sorrow  or  need  is  he  who  can  live  from  his 
inherent  strength,  who  needs  no  scaffolding  of 
commonplace  sympathy  to  uphold  him.  He 
must  ever  be  self-reliant. 

The  wealth  and  prosperity  of  ancient  Rome, 
relying  on  her  slaves  to  do  the  real  work  of  the 
nation,  proved  the  nation's  downfall.  The  con- 
stant dependence  on  the  captives  of  war  to  do 
the  thousand  details  of  life  for  them,  killed  self- 
reliance  in  the  nation  and  in  the  individual. 
Then,  through  weakened  self-reliance  and  the 
increased  opportunity  for  idle,  luxurious  ease 
that  came  with  it,  Rome,  a  nation  of  fighters,  be- 
came,— a  nation  of  men  more  effeminate  than 
women.  As  we  depend  on  others  to  do  those 
things  we  should  do  for  ourselves,  our  self-reli- 
ance weakens  and  our  powers  and  our  control  of 
them  becomes  continuously  less. 


28        The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance 

Man  to  be  great  must  be  self-reliant.  Though 
he  may  not  be  so  in  all  things,  he  must  be  self- 
reliant  in  the  one  in  which  he  would  be  great. 
This  self-reliance  is  not  the  self-sufficiency  of  con- 
ceit. It  is  daring  to  stand  alone.  Be  an  oak,  not 
a  vine.  Be  ready  to  give  support,  but  do  not 
crave  it;  do  not  be  dependent  on  it.  To  develop 
your  true  self-reliance,  you  must  see  from  the 
very  beginning  that  life  is  a  battle  you  must  fight 
for  yourself, — you  must  be  your  own  soldier. 
You  cannot  buy  a  substitute,  you  cannot  win  a 
reprieve,  you  can  never  be  placed  on  the  retired 
list.  The  retired  list  of  life  is, — death.  The 
world  is  busy  with  its  own  cares,  sorrows  and 
joys,  and  pays  little  heed  to  you.  There  is  but 
one  great  password  to  success, — self-reliance. 

If  you  would  learn  to  converse,  put  yourself 
into  positions  where  you  must  speak.  If  you 
would  conquer  your  morbidness,  mingle  with 
the  bright  people  around  you,  no  matter  how  dif- 
ficult it  may  be.  If  you  desire  the  power  that 
some  one  else  possesses,  do  not  envy  his  strength, 
and  dissipate  your  energy  by  weakly  wishing  his 
force  were  yours.  Emulate  the  process  by 
which  it  became  his,  depend  on  your  self-reli- 
ance, pay  the  price  for  it,  and  equal  power  may 
be  yours.  The  individual  must  look  upon  him- 
self as  an  investment,  of  untold  possibilities  if 
rightly  developed, — a  mine  whose  resources  can 
never  be  known  but  by  going  down  into  it  and 
bringing  out  what  is  hidden. 

Man  can  develop  his  self-reliance  by  seeking 


The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance         29 

constantly  to  surpass  himself.  We  try  too  much 
to  surpass  others.  If  we  seek  ever  to  surpass 
ourselves,  we  are  moving  on  a  uniform  line  of 
progress,  that  gives  a  harmonious  unifying  to 
our  growth  in  all  its  parts.  Daniel  Morrell,  at 
one  time  President  of  the  Cambria  Rail  Works, 
that  employed  7,000  men  and  made  a  rail  famed 
throughout  the  world,  was  asked  the  secret  of  the 
great  success  of  the  works.  ' '  We  have  no  secret, " 
he  said,  "  but  this, — we  always  try  to  beat  our  last 
batch  of  rails."  Competition  is  good,  but  it  has  its 
danger  side.  There  is  a  tendency  to  sacrifice 
real  worth  to  mere  appearance,  to  have  seeming 
rather  than  reality.  But  the  true  competition  is 
the  competition  of  the  individual  with  himself, — 
his  present  seeking  to  excel  his  past.  This  means 
real  growth  from  within.  Self-reliance  develops 
it,  and  it  develops  self-reliance.  Let  the  indi- 
vidual feel  thus  as  to  his  own  progress  and  pos- 
sibilities, and  he  can  almost  create  his  life  as  he 
will.  Let  him  never  fall  down  in  despair  at  dan- 
gers and  sorrows  at  a  distance;  they  may  be 
harmless,  like  Bunyan's  stone  lions,  when  he 
nears  them. 

The  man  who  is  self-reliant  does  not  live  in 
the  shadow  of  some  one  else's  greatness;  he 
thinks  for  himself,  depends  on  himself,  and  acts 
for  himself.  In  throwing  the  individual  thus 
back  upon  himself  it  is  not  shutting  his  eyes  to 
the  stimulus  and  light  and  new  life  that  come 
with  the  warm  pressure  of  the  hand,  the  kindly 
word  and  the  sincere  expressions  of  true  friend- 


30        The  Dignity  of  Self-Reliance 

ship.  But  true  friendship  is  rare ;  its  great  value  is 
in  a  crisis, — like  a  lifeboat.  Many  a  boasted 
friend  has  proved  a  leaking,  worthless  "lifeboat" 
when  the  storm  of  adversity  might  make  him 
useful.  In  these  great  crises  of  life,  man  is 
strong  only  as  he  is  strong  from  within,  and  the 
more  he  depends  on  himself  the  stronger  will  he 
become,  and  the  more  able  will  he  be  to  help 
others  in  the  hour  of  their  need.  His  very  life 
will  be  a  constant  help  and  a  strength  to  others, 
as  he  becomes  to  them  a  living  lesson  of  the  dig- 
nity of  self-reliance. 


V 

Failure  as  a  Success 

ofttimes  requires  heroic  courage  to  face 
fruitless  effort,  to  take  up  the  broken 
strands  of  a  life-work,  to  look  bravely 
toward  the  future,  and  proceed  undaunted 
on  our  way.  But  what,  to  our  eyes,  may  seem 
hopeless  failure  is  often  but  the  dawning  of  a 
greater  success.  It  may  contain  in  its  debris  the 
foundation  material  of  a  mighty  purpose,  or  the 
revelation  of  new  and  higher  possibilities. 

Some  years  ago,  it  was  proposed  to  send  logs 
from  Canada  to  New  York,  by  a  new  method. 
The  ingenious  plan  of  Mr.  Joggins  was  to  bind 
great  logs  together  by  cables  and  iron  girders  and 
to  tow  the  cargo  as  a  raft.  When  the  novel 
craft  neared  New  York  and  success  seemed  as- 
sured, a  terrible  storm  arose.  In  the  fury  of  the 
tempest,  the  iron  bands  snapped  like  icicles  and 
the  angry  waters  scattered  the  logs  far  and  wide. 
The  chief  of  the  Hydrographic  Department  at 
Washington  heard  of  the  failure  of  the  experi- 
ment, and  at  once  sent  word  to  shipmasters  the 
world  over,  urging  them  to  watch  carefully 
for  these  logs  which  he  described;  and  to  note 
the  precise  location  of  each  in  latitude  and  longi- 
tude and  the  time  the  observation  was  made. 

31 


32  Failure  as  a  Success 

Hundreds  of  captains,  sailing  over  the  waters  of 
the  earth,  noted  the  logs,  in  the  Atlantic  Ocean, 
in  the  Mediterranean,  in  the  South  Seas — for  into 
all  waters  did  these  venturesome  ones  travel. 
Hundreds  of  reports  were  made,  covering  a 
period  of  weeks  and  months.  These  observa- 
tions were  then  carefully  collated,  systematized 
and  tabulated,  and  discoveries  were  made  as  to 
the  course  of  ocean  currents  that  otherwise  would 
have  been  impossible.  The  loss  of  the  Joggins 
raft  was  not  a  real  failure,  for  it  led  to  one  of  the 
great  discoveries  in  modern  marine  geography 
and  navigation. 

In  our  superior  knowledge  we  are  disposed  to 
speak  in  a  patronizing  tone  of  the  follies  of  the 
alchemists  of  old.  But  their  failure  to  transmute 
the  baser  metals  into  gold  resulted  in  the  birth  of 
chemistry.  They  did  not  succeed  in  what  they 
attempted,  but  they  brought  into  vogue  the  natu- 
ral processes  of  sublimation,  filtration,  distillation, 
and  crystallization ;  they  invented  the  alembic,  the 
retort,  the  sand-bath,  the  water-bath  and  other  val- 
uable instruments.  To  them  is  due  the  discovery 
of  antimony,  sulphuric  ether  and  phosphorus,  the 
cupellation  of  gold  and  silver,  the  determining  of 
the  properties  of  saltpetre  and  its  use  in  gun- 
powder, and  the  discovery  of  the  distillation  of 
essential  oils.  This  was  the  success  of  failure,  a 
wondrous  process  of  Nature  for  the  highest 
growth, — a  mighty  lesson  of  comfort,  strength, 
and  encouragement  if  man  would  only  realize 
and  accept  it. 


Failure  as  a  Success  33 

Many  of  our  failures  sweep  us  to  greater 
heights  of  success,  than  we  ever  hoped  for  in 
our  wildest  dreams.  Life  is  a  successive  unfold- 
ing of  success  from  failure.  In  discovering 
America  Columbus  failed  absolutely.  His  in- 
genious reasoning  and  experiment  led  him  to  be- 
lieve that  by  sailing  westward  hs  would  reach 
India.  Every  redman  in  America  carries  in  his 
name  "Indian,"  the  perpetuation  of  the  memory 
of  the  failure  of  Columbus.  The  Genoese  navi- 
gator did  not  reach  India;  the  cargo  of  "souve- 
nirs" he  took  back  to  Spain  to  show  to  Ferdinand 
and  Isabella  as  proofs  of  his  success,  really  at- 
tested his  failure.  But  the  discovery  of  America 
was  a  greater  success  than  was  any  finding  of  a 
"back-door"  to  India. 

When  David  Livingstone  had  supplemented 
his  theological  education  by  a  medical  course,  he 
was  ready  to  enter  the  missionary  field.  For 
over  three  years  he  had  studied  tirelessly,  with 
all  energies  concentrated  on  one  aim, — to  spread 
the  gospel  in  China.  The  hour  came  when  he 
was  ready  to  start  out  with  noble  enthusiasm 
for  his  chosen  work,  to  consecrate  himself  and 
his  life  to  his  unselfish  ambition.  Then  word 
came  from  China  that  the  "opium  war"  would 
make  it  folly  to  attempt  to  enter  the  country. 
Disappointment  and  failure  did  not  long  daunt 
him;  he  offered  himself  as  missionary  to  Africa, 
— and  he  was  accepted.  His  glorious  failure  to 
reach  China  opened  a  whole  continent  to  light 
and  truth.  His  study  proved  an  ideal  preparation 


34.  Failure  as  a  Success 

for  his  labors  as  physician,  explorer,  teacher  and 
evangel  in  the  wilds  of  Africa. 

Business  reverses  and  the  failure  of  his  partner 
threw  upon  the  broad  shoulders  and  the  still 
broader  honor  and  honesty  of  Sir  Walter  Scott 
a  burden  of  responsibility  that  forced  him  to 
write.  The  failure  spurred  him  to  almost  super- 
human effort.  The  masterpieces  of  Scotch  his- 
toric fiction  that  have  thrilled,  entertained  and 
uplifted  millions  of  his  fellow-men  are  a  glorious 
monument  on  the  field  of  a  seeming  failure. 

When  Millet,  the  painter  of  the  "Angelus'" 
worked  on  his  almost  divine  canvas,  in  which 
the  very  air  seems  pulsing  with  the  regenerating 
essence  of  spiritual  reverence,  he  was  painting 
against  time,  he  was  antidoting  sorrow,  he  was 
racing  against  death.  His  brush  strokes,  put  on 
in  the  early  morning  hours  before  going  to  his 
menial  duties  as  a  railway  porter,  in  the  dusk 
like  that  perpetuated  on  his  canvas, — meant 
strength,  food  and  medicine  for  the  dying  wife 
he  adored.  The  art  failure  that  cast  him  into  the 
depths  of  poverty  unified  with  marvellous  inten- 
sity all  the  finer  elements  of  his  nature.  This 
rare  spiritual  unity,  this  purging  of  all  the  dross 
of  triviality  as  he  passed  through  the  furnace  of 
poverty,  trial,  and  sorrow  gave  eloquence  to  his 
brush  and  enabled  him  to  paint  as  never  before, — 
as  no  prosperity  would  have  made  possible. 

Failure  is  often  the  turning-point,  the  pivot  of 
circumstance  that  swings  us  to  higher  levels.  It 
may  not  be  financial  success,  it  may  not  be  fame; 


Failure  as  a  Success  35 

it  may  be  new  draughts  of  spiritual,  moral  or 
mental  inspiration  that  will  change  us  for  all  the 
later  years  of  our  life.  Life  is  not  really  what 
comes  to  us,  but  what  we  get  from  it. 

Whether  man  has  had  wealth  or  poverty, 
failure  or  success,  counts  for  little  when  it  is 
past.  There  is  but  one  question  for  him  to  an- 
swer, to  face  boldly  and  honestly  as  an  individual 
alone  with  his  conscience  and  his  destiny: 

"How  will  I  let  that  poverty  or  wealth  af- 
feet  me?  If  that  trial  or  deprivation  has  left 
me  better,  truer,  nobler,  then, — poverty  has  been 
riches,  failure  has  been  a  success.  If  wealth 
has  come  to  me  and  has  made  me  vain,  arro- 
gant, contemptuous,  uncharitable,  cynical,  clos- 
ing from  me  all  the  tenderness  of  life,  all  the 
channels  of  higher  development,  of  possible 
good  to  my  fellow-man,  making  me  the  mere 
custodian  of  a  money-bag,  then, — wealth  has  lied 
to  me,  it  has  been  failure,  not  success;  it  has  not 
been  riches,  it  has  been  dark,  treacherous  poverty 
that  stole  from  me  even  Myself."  All  things  be- 
come for  us  then  what  we  take  from  them. 

Failure  is  one  of  God's  educators.  It  is  experi- 
ence leading  man  to  higher  things;  it  is  the  reve- 
lation of  a  way,  a  path  hitherto  unknown  to  us. 
The  best  men  in  the  world,  those  who  have 
made  the  greatest  real  successes  look  back  with 
serene  happiness  on  their  failures.  The  turning 
of  the  face  of  Time  shows  all  things  in  a  won- 
drously  illuminated  and  satisfying  perspective. 

Many  a  man  is  thankful  to-day  that  some  pe!  ty 


36  Failure  as  a  Success 

success  for  which  he  once  struggled,  melted  into 
thin  air  as  his  hand  sought  to  clutch  it.  Failure 
is  often  the  rock-bottom  foundation  of  real 
success.  If  man,  in  a  few  instances  of  his  life 
can  say,  "  Those  failures  were  the  best  things 
in  the  world  that  could  have  happened  to  me," 
should  he  not  face  new  failures  with  undaunted 
courage  and  trust  that  the  miraculous  ministry  of 
Nature  may  transform  these  new  stumbling- 
blocks  into  new  stepping-stones  ? 

Our  highest  hopes,  are  often  destroyed  to  pre- 
pare us  for  better  things.  The  failure  of  the 
caterpillar  is  the  birth  of  the  butterfly ;  the  pass- 
ing of  the  bud  is  the  becoming  of  the  rose;  the 
death  or  destruction  of  the  seed  is  the  prelude  to 
its  resurrection  as  wheat.  It  is  at  night,  in  the 
darkest  hours,  those  preceding  dawn,  that  plants 
grow  best,  that  they  most  increase  in  size.  May 
this  not  be  one  of  Nature's  gentle  showings  to 
man  of  the  times  when  he  grows  best,  of  the 
darkness  of  failure  that  is  evolving  into  the  sun- 
light of  success.  Let  us  fear  only  the  failure  of 
not  living  the  right  as  we  see  it,  leaving  the  re- 
sults to  the  guardianship  of  the  Infinite. 

If  we  think  of  any  supreme  moment  of  our 
lives,  any  great  success,  any  one  who  is  dear  to 
us,  and  then  consider  how  we  reached  that  mo- 
ment, that  success,  that  friend,  we  will  be  sur- 
prised and  strengthened  by  the  revelation.  As 
we  trace  each  one,  back,  step  by  step,  through 
the  genealogy  of  circumstances,  we  will  see  hou 
logical  has  been  the  course  of  our  joy  and  sue- 


Failure  as  a  Success  37 

cess,  from  sorrow  and  failure,  and  that  what 
gives  us  most  happiness  to-day  is  inextricably 
connected  with  what  once  caused  us  sorrow. 
Many  of  the  rivers  of  our  greatest  prosperity  and 
growth  have  had  their  source  and  their  trickling 
increase  into  volume  among  the  dark,  gloomy 
recesses  of  our  failure. 

There  is  no  honest  and  true  work,  carried 
along  with  constant  and  sincere  purpose  that 
ever  really  fails.  If  it  sometime  seem  to  be 
wasted  effort,  it  will  prove  to  us  a  new  lesson  of 
"how"  to  walk;  the  secret  of  our  failures  will 
prove  to  us  the  inspiration  of  possible  successes. 
Man  living  with  the  highest  aims,  ever  as  best  he 
can,  in  continuous  harmony  with  them,  is  a  suc- 
cess, no  matter  what  statistics  of  failure  a  near- 
sighted and  half-blind  world  of  critics  and  com- 
mentators may  lay  at  his  door. 

High  ideals,  noble  efforts  will  make  seeming  fail- 
ures but  trifles,  they  need  not  dishearten  us;  they 
should  prove  sources  of  new  strength.  The  rocky 
way  may  prove  safer  than  the  slippery  path  of 
smoothness.  Birds  cannot  fly  best  with  the  wind 
but  against  it;  ships  do  not  progress  in  calm,  when 
the  sails  flap  idly  against  the  unstrained  masts. 

The  alchemy  of  Nature,  superior  to  that  of  the 
Paracelsians,  constantly  transmutes  the  baser 
metals  of  failure  into  the  later  pure  gold  of  higher 
success,  if  the  mind  of  the  worker  be  kept  true, 
constant  and  untiring  in  the  service,  and  he  have 
that  sublime  courage  that  defies  fate  to  its  worst 
while  he  does  his  best. 


VI 

Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times 

IFE  is  a  wondrously  complex  problem  for 
the  individual,  until,  some  day,  in  a  mo- 
ment of  illumination,  he  awakens  to  the 
great  realization  that  he  can  make  it 
simple, — never  quite  simple,  but  always  simpler. 
There  are  a  thousand  mysteries  of  right  and 
wrong  that  have  baffled  the  wise  men  of  the 
ages.  There  are  depths  in  the  great  fundamental 
questions  of  the  human  race  that  no  plummet  of 
philosophy  has  ever  sounded.  There  are  wild 
cries  of  honest  hunger  for  truth  that  seek  to 
pierce  the  silence  beyond  the  grave,  but  to  them 
ever  echo  back, — only  a  repetition  of  their  unan- 
swered cries. 

To  us  all,  comes,  at  times,  the  great  note  of 
questioning  despair  that  darkens  our  horizon  and 
paralyzes  our  effort:  "If  there  really  be  a  God, 
if  eternal  justice  really  rule  the  world,"  we  say, 
"why  should  life  be  as  it  is?  Why  do  some 
men  starve  while  others  feast;  why  does  virtue 
often  languish  in  the  shadow  while  vice  triumphs 
in  the  sunshine;  why  does  failure  so  often  dog 
the  footsteps  of  honest  effort,  while  the  success 
that  comes  from  trickery  and  dishonor  is  greeted 
with  the  world's  applause  ?  How  is  it  that  the 

38 


Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times      39 

loving  father  of  one  family  is  taken  by  death, 
while  the  worthless  incumbrance  of  another  is 
spared?  Why  is  there  so  much  unnecessary 
pain,  sorrowing  and  suffering  in  the  world — 
why,  indeed,  should  there  be  any?" 

Neither  philosophy  nor  religion  can  give  any 
final  satisfactory  answer  that  is  capable  of  logical 
demonstration,  of  absolute  proof.  There  is  ever, 
even  after  the  best  explanations,  a  residuum 
of  the  unexplained.  We  must  then  fall  back 
in  the  eternal  arms  of  faith,  and  be  wise  enough 
to  say,  "  I  will  not  be  disconcerted  by  these 
problems  of  life,  I  will  not  permit  them  to 
plunge  me  into  doubt,  and  to  cloud  my  life  with 
vagueness  and  uncertainty.  Man  arrogates  much 
to  himself  when  he  demands  from  the  Infinite  the 
full  solution  of  all  His  mysteries.  I  will  found 
my  life  on  the  impregnable  rock  of  a  simple 
fundamental  truth: — 'This  glorious  creation  with 
its  millions  of  wondrous  phenomena  pulsing  ever 
in  harmony  with  eternal  law  must  have  a  Crea- 
tor, that  Creator  must  be  omniscient  and  om- 
nipotent. But  that  Creator  Himself  cannot,  in 
justice,  demand  of  any  creature  more  than  the  best 
that  that  individual  can  give.'  I  will  do  each 
day,  in  every  moment,  the  best  I  can  by  the  light 
I  have;  I  will  ever  seek  more  light,  more  perfect 
illumination  of  truth,  and  ever  live  as  best  I  can 
in  harmony  with  the  truth  as  I  see  it.  If  failure 
come  I  will  meet  it  bravely  ;  if  my  pathway  then 
lie  in  the  shadow  of  trial,  sorrow  and  suffering,  I 
shall  have  the  restful  peace  and  the  calm  strength 


40       Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times 

of  one  who  has  done  his  best,  who  can  look  back 
upon  the  past  with  no  pang  of  regret,  and  who 
has  heroic  courage  in  facing  the  results,  what- 
ever they  be,  knowing  that  he  could  not  make 
them  different." 

Upon  this  life-plan,  this  foundation,  man  may 
erect  any  superstructure  of  religion  or  philosophy 
that  he  conscientiously  can  erect;  he  should  add 
to  his  equipment  for  living  every  shred  of  strength 
and  inspiration,  moral,  menta,  or  spiritual  that  is 
in  his  power  to  secure.  This  simple  working 
faith  is  opposed  to  no  creed,  is  a  substitute  for 
none;  it  is  but  a  primary  belief,  a  citadel,  a  refuge 
where  the  individual  can  retire  for  strength  when 
the  battle  of  life  grows  hard. 

A  mere  theory  of  life,  that  remains  but  a  theory, 
is  about  as  useful  to  a  man,  as  a  gilt-edged  menu 
is  to  a  starving  sailor  on  a  raft  in  mid-ocean.  It 
is  irritating  but  not  stimulating.  No  rule  for 
higher  living  will  help  a  man  in  the  slightest,  un- 
til he  reach  out  and  appropriate  it  for  himself, 
until  he  make  it  practical  in  his  daily  life,  until 
that  seed  of  theory  in  his  mind  blossom  into  a 
thousand  flowers  of  thought  and  word  and  act. 

If  a  man  honestly  seeks  to  live  his  best  at  all 
times,  that  determination  is  visible  in  every 
moment  of  his  living,  no  trifle  in  his  life  can 
be  too  insignificant  to  reflect  his  principle  of 
living.  The  sun  illuminates  and  beautifies  a  fal- 
len leaf  by  the  roadside  as  impartially  as  a  tower- 
ing mountain  peak  in  the  Alps.  Every  drop  of 
water  in  the  ocean  is  an  epitome  of  the  chemistry 


Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times       41 

of  the  whole  ocean  ;  every  drop  is  subject  to  pre- 
cisely the  same  laws  as  dominate  the  united  in- 
finity of  billions  of  drops  that  make  that  miracle 
of  Nature,  men  call  the  Sea.  No  matter  how 
humble  the  calling  of  the  individual,  how  uninter- 
esting and  dull  the  round  of  his  duties,  he  should 
do  his  best.  He  should  dignify  what  he  is  do- 
ing by  the  mind  he  puts  into  it,  he  should  vital- 
ize what  little  he  has  of  power  or  energy  or  abil- 
ity or  opportunity,  in  order  to  prepare  himself  to 
be  equal  to  higher  privileges  when  they  come. 
This  will  never  lead  man  to  that  weak  content 
\hat  is  satisfied  with  whatever  falls  to  his  lot.  It 
will  rather  fill  his  mind  with  that  divine  discon- 
lent  that  cheerfully  accepts  the  best, — merely 
us  a  temporary  substitute  for  something  better. 

The  man  who  is  seeking  ever  to  do  his  best  is 
Khe  man  who  is  keen,  active,  wide-awake,  and 
aggressive.  He  is  ever  watchful  of  himself  in 
trifles;  his  standard  is  not  "  What  will  the  world 
say  ?  "  but  "  Is  it  worthy  of  me  ?  " 

Edwin  Booth,  one  of  the  greatest  actors  on 
the  American  stage,  would  never  permit  him- 
self to  assume  an  ungraceful  attitude,  even  in  his 
hours  of  privacy.  In  this  simple  thing,  he  ever 
lived  his  best.  On  the  stage  every  move  was 
one  of  unconscious  grace.  Those  of  his  company 
who  were  conscious  of  their  motions  were  the 
awkward  ones,  who  were  seeking  in  public 
to  undo  or  to  conceal  the  carelessness  of  the 
gestures  and  motions  of  their  private  life.  The 
man  who  is  slipshod  and  thoughtless  in  his 


42       Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times 

daily  speech,  whose  vocabulary  is  a  collection  of 
anaemic  commonplaces,  whose  repetitions  of 
phrases  and  extravagance  of  interjections  act  but 
as  feeble  disguises  to  his  lack  of  ideas,  will  never 
be  brilliant  on  an  occasion  when  he  longs  to  out- 
shine the  stars.  Living  at  one's  best  is  constant 
preparation  for  instant  use.  It  can  never  make 
one  over-precise,  self-conscious,  affected,  or  prig- 
gish. Education,  in  its  highest  sense,  is  con- 
scious training  of  mind  or  body  to  act  uncon- 
sciously. It  is  conscious  formation  of  mental 
habits,  not  mere  acquisition  of  information. 

One  of  the  many  ways  in  which  the  individual 
unwisely  eclipses  himself,  is  in  his  worship  of 
the  fetich  of  luck.  He  feels  that  all  others  are 
lucky,  and  that  whatever  he  attempts,  fails.  He 
does  not  realize  the  untiring  energy,  the  unre- 
mitting concentration,  the  heroic  courage,  the 
sublime  patience  that  is  the  secret  of  some  men's 
success.  Their  "luck"  was  that  they  had  pre- 
pared themselves  to  be  equal  to  their  opportunity 
when  it  came  and  were  awake  to  recognize  it 
and  receive  it.  His  own  opportunity  came  and 
departed  unnoted,  it  would  not  waken  him  from 
his  dreams  of  some  untold  wealth  that  would  fall 
into  his  lap.  So  he  grows  discouraged  and 
envies  those  whom  he  should  emulate,  and  he 
bandages  his  arm  and  chloroforms  his  energies, 
and  performs  his  duties  in  a  perfunctory  way,  or 
he  passes  through  life,  just  ever  "sampling" 
lines  of  activity. 

The  honest,   faithful  struggler  should  always 


Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times       43 

realize  that  failure  is  but  an  episode  in  a  true 
man's  life, — never  the  whole  story.  It  is  never 
easy  to  meet,  and  no  philosophy  can  make  it  so, 
but  the  steadfast  courage  to  master  conditions,  in- 
stead of  complaining  of  them,  will  help  him  on 
his  way ;  it  will  ever  enable  him  to  get  the  best 
out  of  what  he  has.  He  never  knows  the  long 
series  of  vanquished  failures  that  give  solidity  to 
some  one  else's  success;  he  does  not  realize  the 
price  that  some  rich  man,  the  innocent  football 
of  political  malcontents  and  demagogues,  has 
heroicly  paid  for  wealth  and  position. 

The  man  who  has  a  pessimist's  doubt  of  all 
things;  who  demands  a  certified  guarantee  of  his 
future;  who  ever  fears  his  work  will  not  be 
recognized  or  appreciated ;  or  that  after  all,  it  is 
really  not  worth  while,  will  never  live  his  best. 
He  is  dulling  his  capacity  for  real  progress  by  his 
hypnotic  course  of  excuses  for  inactivity,  instead 
of  a  strong  tonic  of  reasons  for  action. 

One  of  the  most  weakening  elements  in  the 
individual  make-up  is  the  surrender  to  the  on- 
coming of  years.  Man's  self-confidence  dims  and 
dies  in  the  fear  of  age.  "  This  new  thought,"  he 
says  of  some  suggestion  tending  to  higher  de- 
velopment, "is  good;  it  is  what  we  need.  I  am 
glad  to  have  it  for  my  children;  I  would  have 
been  happy  to  have  had  some  such  help  when  I 
was  at  school,  but  it  is  too  late  for  me.  I  am  a 
man  advanced  in  years." 

This  is  but  blind  closing  of  life  to  wondrous 
possibilities.  The  knell  of  lost  opportunity  is 


44       Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times 

never  tolled  in  this  life.  It  is  never  too  late  to 
recognize  truth  and  to  live  by  it.  It  repuires  only 
greater  effort,  closer  attention,  deeper  consecra- 
tion; but  the  impossible  does  not  exist  for  the 
man  who  is  self-confident  and  is  willing  to  pay 
the  price  in  time  and  struggle  for  his  success  or 
development.  Later  in  life,  the  assessments  are 
heavier  in  progress,  as  in  life  insurance,  but  that 
matters  not  to  that  mighty  self-confidence  that 
will  not  grow  old  while  knowledge  can  keep  it 
young. 

Socrates,  when  his  hair  whitened  with  the 
snow  of  age,  learned  to  play  on  instruments  of 
music.  Cato,  at  fourscore,  began  his  study  of 
Greek,  and  the  same  age  saw  Plutarch  beginning, 
with  the  enthusiasm  of  a  boy,  his  first  lessons  in 
Latin.  The  Character  of  Man,  Theophrastus' 
greatest  work,  was  begun  on  his  ninetieth  birth- 
day. Chaucer's  Canterbury  Tales  was  the  work 
of  the  poet's  declining  years.  Ronsard,  the 
father  of  French  poetry,  whose  sonnets  even 
translation  cannot  destroy,  did  not  develop  his 
poetic  faculty  until  nearly  fifty.  Benjamin 
Franklin  at  this  age  had  just  taken  his  really  first 
steps  of  importance  in  philosophic  pursuits. 
Arnauld,  the  theologian  and  sage,  translated 
Josephus  in  his  eightieth  year.  Winckelmann, 
one  of  the  most  famous  writers  on  classic  an- 
tiquities, was  the  son  of  a  shoemaker,  and  lived 
in  obscurity  and  ignorance  until  the  prime  of  life. 
Hobbes,  the  English  philosopher,  published  his 
version  of  the  Odyssey  in  his  eighty-seventh 


Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times       45 

year,  and  his  Iliad  one  year  later.  Chevreul,  the 
great  French  scientist,  whose  untiring  labors  in 
the  realm  of  color  have  so  enriched  the  world, 
was  busy,  keen  and  active  when  Death  called 
him,  at  the  age  of  103. 

These  men  did  not  fear  age;  these  few  names 
from  the  great  muster-roll  of  the  famous  ones 
who  defied  the  years,  should  be  voices  of  hope 
and  heartening  to  every  individual  whose  courage 
and  confidence  is  weak.  The  path  of  truth, 
higher  living,  truer  development  in  every  phase  of 
life,  is  never  shut  from  the  individual — until  he 
closes  it  himself.  Let  man  feel  this,  believe  it 
and  make  this  faith  a  real  and  living  factor  in 
his  life  and  there  are  no  limits  to  his  progress. 
He  has  but  to  live  his  best  at  all  times,  and  rest 
calm  and  untroubled  no  matter  what  results  come 
to  his  efforts.  The  constant  looking  backward  to 
what  might  have  been,  instead  of  forward  to  what 
may  be,  is  a  great  weakener  of  self-confidence. 
This  worry  for  the  old  past,  this  wasted  energy, 
for  that  which  no  power  in  the  world  can  restore, 
ever  lessens  the  individual's  faith  in  himself, 
weakens  his  efforts  to  develop  himself  for  the 
future  to  the  perfection  of  his  possibilities. 

Nature  in  her  beautiful  love  and  tenderness, 
says  to  man,  weakened  and  worn  and  weary 
with  the  struggle,  "Do  in  the  best  way  you  can 
the  trifle  that  is  under  your  hand  at  this  moment; 
do  it  in  the  best  spirit  of  preparation  for  the  future 
your  thought  suggests;  bring  all  the  light  of 
knowledge  from  all  the  past  to  aid  you.  Do  this 


46       Doing  Our  Best  at  All  Times 

and  you  have  done  your  best.  The  past  is  for- 
ever closed  to  you.  It  is  closed  forever  to  you. 
No  worry,  no  struggle,  no  suffering,  no  agony 
of  despair  can  alter  it.  It  is  as  much  beyond 
your  power  as  if  it  were  a  million  years  of 
eternity  behind  you.  Turn  all  that  past,  with  its 
sad  hours,  weakness  and  sin,  its  wasted  oppor- 
tunities as  light;  in  confidence  and  hope,  upon 
the  future.  Turn  it  all  in  fuller  truth  and  light  so 
as  to  make  each  trifle  of  this  present  a  new  past 
it  will  be  joy  to  look  back  to;  each  trifle  a 
grander,  nobler,  and  more  perfect  preparation  for 
the  future.  The  present  and  the  future  you  can 
make  from  it,  is  yours;  the  past  has  gone  back, 
with  all  its  messages,  all  its  history,  all  its  records 
to  the  God  who  loaned  you  the  golden  moments 
to  use  in  obedience  to  His  law. 


VII 

The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness 

URING  my  whole  life  I  have  not  had 
twenty-four  hours  of  happiness."  So 
said  Prince  Bismarck,  one  of  the 
greatest  statesmen  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  Eighty-three  years  of  wealth,  fame, 
honors,  power,  influence,  prosperity  and  triumph, 
— years  when  he  held  an  empire  in  his  fingers, — 
but  not  one  day  of  happiness! 

Happiness  is  the  greatest  paradox  in  Nature. 
It  can  grow  in  any  soil,  live  under  any  conditions. 
It  defies  environment.  It  comes  from  within;  it 
is  the  revelation  of  the  depths  of  the  inner  life  as 
light  and  heat  proclaim  the  sun  from  which  they 
radiate.  Happiness  consists  not  of  having,  but 
of  being;  not  of  possessing,  but  of  enjoying.  It 
is  the  warm  glow  of  a  heart  at  peace  with  itself. 
A  martyr  at  the  stake  may  have  happiness  that  a 
king  on  his  throne  might  envy.  Man  is  the 
creator  of  his  own  happiness;  it  is  the  aroma  of 
a  life  lived  in  harmony  with  high  ideals.  For 
what  a  man  has,  he  may  be  dependent  on  others; 
what  he  is,  rests  with  him  alone.  What  he  ob- 
tains in  life  is  but  acquisition;  what  he  attains,  is 
growth.  Happiness  is  the  soul's  joy  in  the  pos- 
session of  the  intangible.  Absolute,  perfect,  con- 
47 


48      The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness 

tinuous  happiness  in  life,  is  impossible  for  the 
human.  It  would  mean  the  consummation  of 
attainments,  the  individual  consciousness  of  a 
perfectly  fulfilled  destiny.  Happiness  is  para- 
doxic  because  it  may  coexist  with  trial,  sorrow 
and  poverty.  It  is  the  gladness  of  the  heart, 
— rising  superior  to  all  conditions. 

Happiness  has  a  number  of  under-studies, — 
gratification,  satisfaction,  content,  and  pleasure, — 
clever  imitators  that  simulate  its  appearance  rather 
than  emulate  its  method.  Gratification  is  a  har- 
mony between  our  desires  and  our  possessions. 
It  is  ever  incomplete,  it  is  the  thankful  accept- 
ance of  part.  It  is  a  mental  pleasure  in  the, 
quality  of  what  one  receives,  an  unsatisfiedness 
as  to  the  quantity.  It  may  be  an  element  in  hap. 
piness,  but,  in  itself, — it  is  not  happiness. 

Satisfaction  is  perfect  identity  of  our  desires, 
and  our  possessions.  It  exists  only  so  long  a& 
this  perfect  union  and  unity  can  be  preserved. 
But  every  realized  ideal  gives  birth  to  new  ideals, 
every  step  in  advance  reveals  large  domains  of 
the  unattained;  every  feeding  stimulates  new 
appetites, — then  the  desires  and  possessions  are 
no  longer  identical,  no  longer  equal;  new  crav- 
ings call  forth  new  activities,  the  equipoise  is 
destroyed,  and  dissatisfaction  reenters.  Man 
might  possess  everything  tangible  in  the  world 
and  yet  not  be  happy,  for  happiness  is  the  satis- 
fying of  the  soul,  not  of  the  mind  or  the  body. 
Dissatisfaction,  in  its  highest  sense,  is  the  key- 
note of  all  advance,  the  evidence  of  new  aspira- 


The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness      49 

tions,  the  guarantee  of  the  progressive  revelation 
of  new  possibilities. 

Content  is  a  greatly  overrated  virtue.  It  is  a 
kind  of  diluted  despair;  it  is  the  feeling  with 
which  we  continue  to  accept  substitutes,  without 
striving  for  the  realities.  Content  makes  the 
trained  individual  swallow  vinegar  and  try  to 
smack  his  lips  as  if  it  were  wine.  Content  ena- 
bles one  to  warm  his  hands  at  the  fire  of  a  past 
joy  that  exists  only  in  memory.  Content  is  a 
mental  and  moral  chloroform  that  deadens  the 
activities  of  the  individual  to  rise  to  higher  planes 
of  life  and  growth.  Man  should  never  be  con- 
tented with  anything  less  than  the  best  efforts  of 
his  nature  can  possibly  secure  for  him.  Content 
makes  the  world  more  comfortable  for  the  in- 
dividual, but  it  is  the  death-knell  of  progress. 
Man  should  be  content  with  each  step  of  prog- 
ress merely  as  a  station,  discontented  with  it  as 
a  destination;  contented  with  it  as  a  step;  dis- 
contented with  it  as  a  finality.  There  are  times 
when  a  man  should  be  content  with  what  he 
has,  but  never  with  what  he  is. 

But  content  is  not  happiness;  neither  is  pleas- 
ure. Pleasure  is  temporary,  happiness  is  con- 
tinuous; pleasure  is  a  note,  happiness  is  a  sym- 
phony; pleasure  may  exist  when  conscience 
utters  protests ;  happiness, — never.  Pleasure  may 
have  its  dregs  and  its  lees ;  but  none  can  be  found 
in  the  cup  of  happiness. 

Man  is  the  only  animal  that  can  be  really 
happy.  To  the  rest  of  the  creation  belong  only 


50      The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness 

weak  imitations  of  the  understudies.  Happiness 
represents  a  peaceful  attunement  of  a  life  with  a 
standard  of  living.  It  can  never  be  made  by  the 
individual,  by  himself,  for  himself.  It  is  one  of 
the  incidental  by-products  of  an  unselfish  life. 
No  man  can  make  his  own  happiness  the  one 
object  of  his  life  and  attain  it,  any  more  than  he 
can  jump  on  the  far  end  of  his  shadow.  If  you 
would  hit  the  bull's-eye  of  happiness  on  the  tar- 
get of  life,  aim  above  it.  Place  other  things 
higher  than  your  own  happiness  and  it  will  surely 
come  to  you.  You  can  buy  pleasure,  you  can 
acquire  content,  you  can  become  satisfied, — but 
Nature  never  put  real  happiness  on  the  bargain- 
counter.  It  is  the  undetachable  accompaniment 
of  true  living.  It  is  calm  and  peaceful ;  it  never 
lives  in  an  atmosphere  of  worry  or  of  hopeless 
struggle. 

The  basis  of  happiness  is  the  love  of  some- 
thing outside  self.  Search  every  instance  of 
happiness  in  the  world,  and  you  will  find,  when 
all  the  incidental  features  are  eliminated,  there  is 
always  the  constant,  unchangeable  element  of 
love, — love  of  parent  for  child;  love  of  man  and 
woman  for  each  other;  love  of  humanity  in  some 
form,  or  a  great  life  work  into  which  the  in- 
dividual throws  all  his  energies. 

Happiness  is  the  voice  of  optimism,  of  faith,  of 
simple,  steadfast  love.  No  cynic  or  pessimist  can 
be  really  happy.  A  cynic  is  a  man  who  is 
morally  near-sighted,— and  brags  about  it.  He 
sees  the  evil  in  his  own  heart,  and  thinks  he  sees 


The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness      51 

the  world.  He  lets  a  mote  in  his  eye  eclipse  the 
sun.  An  incurable  cynic  is  an  individual  who 
should  long  for  death, — for  life  cannot  bring  him 
happiness,  death  might.  The  keynote  of  Bis- 
marck's lack  of  happiness  was  his  profound  dis- 
trust of  human  nature. 

There  is  a  royal  road  to  happiness;  it  lies  in 
Consecration,  Concentration,  Conquest  and  Con- 
science. 

Consecration  is  dedicating  the  individual  life  to 
the  service  of  others,  to  some  noble  mission,  to 
realizing  some  unselfish  ideal.  Life  is  not  some- 
thing to  be  lived  through  ;  it  is  something  to  be 
lived  up  to.  It  is  a  privilege,  not  a  penal  servi- 
tude of  so  many  decades  on  earth.  Consecration 
places  the  object  of  life  above  the  mere  acquisi- 
tion of  money,  as  a  finality.  The  man  who  is 
unselfish,  kind,  loving,  tender,  helpful,  ready  to 
lighten  the  burden  of  those  around  him,  to 
hearten  the  struggling  ones,  to  forget  himself 
sometimes  in  remembering  others, — is  on  the  right 
road  to  happiness.  Consecration  is  ever  active, 
bold  and  aggressive,  fearing  naught  but  possible 
disloyalty  to  high  ideals. 

Concentration  makes  the  individual  life  simpler 
and  deeper.  It  cuts  away  the  shams  and  pre- 
tences of  modern  living  and  limits  life  to  its  truest 
essentials.  Worry,  fear,  useless  regret, — all  the 
great  wastes  that  sap  mental,  moral  or  physical 
energy  must  be  sacrificed,  or  the  individual  need- 
lessly destroys  half  the  possibilities  of  living.  A 
great  purpose  in  life,  something  that  unifies  the 


52      The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness 

strands  and  threads  of  each  day's  thinking,  some- 
thing that  takes  the  sting  from  the  petty  trials, 
sorrows,  sufferings  and  blunders  of  life,  is  a  great 
aid  to  Concentration.  Soldiers  in  battle  may  for- 
get their  wounds,  or  even  be  unconscious  of 
them,  in  the  inspiration  of  battling  for  what  they 
believe  is  right.  Concentration  dignifies  an 
humble  life;  it  makes  a  great  life, — sublime.  In 
morals  it  is  a  short-cut  to  simplicity.  It  leads  to 
right  for  right's  sake,  without  thought  of  policy 
or  of  reward.  It  brings  calm  and  rest  to  the  in- 
dividual,— a  serenity  that  is  but  the  sunlight  oi 
happiness. 

Conquest  is  the  overcoming  of  an  evil  habit, 
the  rising  superior  to  opposition  and  attack,  the 
spiritual  exaltation  that  comes  from  resisting 
the  invasion  of  the  grovelling  material  side  of 
life.  Sometimes  when  you  are  worn  and 
weak  with  the  stiuggle;  when  it  seems  that  justice 
is  a  dream,  that  honesty  and  loyalty  and  truth 
count  for  nothing,  that  the  devil  is  the  only  good 
paymaster;  when  hope  grows  dJm  and  flickers, 
then  is  the  time  when  you  must  tower  in  the 
great  sublime  faith  that  Right  must  prevail,  then 
must  you  throttle  these  imps  of  doubt  and  de- 
spair, you  must  master  yourself  to  master  the 
world  around  you.  This  is  Conquest;  this  is 
what  counts.  Even  a  log  can  float  with  the  cur- 
rent, it  takes  a  man  to  fight  sturdily  against  an 
opposing  tide  that  would  sweep  his  craft  out  of 
its  course.  When  the  jealousies,  the  petty  in 
trigues  and  the  meannesses  and  the  misunder- 


The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness      53 

standings  in  life  assail  you, — rise  above  them.  Be 
like  a  lighthouse  that  illumines  and  beautifies 
the  snarling,  swashing  waves  of  the  storm  that 
threaten  it,  that  seek  to  undermine  it  and  seek  to 
wash  over  it.  This  is  Conquest.  When  the 
chance  to  win  fame,  wealth,  success  or  the  attain- 
ment of  your  heart's  desire,  by  sacrifice  of  honor 
or  principle,  comes  to  you  and  it  does  not  affect 
you  long  enough  even  to  seem  a  temptation,  you 
have  been  the  victor.  That  too  is  Conquest. 
And  Conquest  is  part  of  the  royal  road  to  Happi- 
ness. 

Conscience,  as  the  mentor,  the  guide  and  com- 
pass of  every  act,  leads  ever  to  Happiness. 
When  the  individual  can  stay  alone  with  his  con- 
science and  get  its  approval,  without  using  force 
or  specious  logic,  then  he  begins  to  know  what 
real  Happiness  is.  But  the  individual  must  be 
careful  that  he  is  not  appealing  to  a  conscience 
perverted  or  deadened  by  the  wrongdoing  and 
subsequent  deafness  of  its  owner.  The  man  who 
is  honestly  seeking  to  live  his  life  in  Consecra- 
tion, Concentration  and  Conquest,  living  from 
day  to  day  as  best  he  can,  by  the  light  he  has, 
may  rely  explicitly  on  his  Conscience.  He  can 
shut  his  ears  to  "what  the  world  says"  and  find 
in  the  approval  of  his  own  conscience  the  high- 
est earthly  tribune, — the  voice  of  the  Infinite  com- 
muning with  the  Individual. 

Unhappiness  is  the  hunger  to  get;  Happiness  is 
the  hunger  to  give.  True  happiness  must  ever 
have  the  tinge  of  sorrow  outlived,  the  sense  of 


54      The  Royal  Road  to  Happiness 

pain  softened  by  the  mellowing  years,  the  chas- 
tening of  loss  that  in  the  wondrous  mystery  of 
time  transmutes  our  suffering  into  love  and  sym- 
pathy with  others. 

If  the  individual  should  set  out  for  a  single  day 
to  give  Happiness,  to  make  life  happier,  brighter 
and  sweeter,  not  for  himself,  but  for  others,  he 
would  find  a  wondrous  revelation  of  what  Hap- 
piness really  is.  The  greatest  of  the  world's 
heroes  could  not  by  any  series  of  acts  of  heroism 
do  as  much  real  good  as  any  individual  living  his 
whole  life  in  seeking,  from  day  to  day,  to  make 
others  happy. 

Each  day  there  should  be  fresh  resolution,  new 
strength,  and  renewed  enthusiasm.  ' '  Just  for  To- 
day "  might  be  the  daily  motto  of  thousands  of 
societies  throughout  the  country,  composed  of 
members  bound  together  to  make  the  world  bet- 
ter through  constant  simple  acts  of  kindness, 
constant  deeds  of  sweetness  and  love.  And  Hap- 
piness would  come  to  them,  in  its  highest  and 
best  form,  not  because  they  would  seek  to  absorb 
it,  but, — because  they  seek  to  radiate  it 


A  Million  and  a  Half  Sold  of 

RALPH  CONNOR'S  WORKS 


The  DoCtOr.      A  Tale  of  the  Rockies. 

*3&h  thousand.     12mo,          ...  1.50, 

"  The  best  thing  Ralph  Connor  has  done  since  '  The 
Sky  Pilot'  and  pehaps  the  best  that  he  has  ever  done. 
Here  he  is  at  his  strongest  and  best  in  drawing  rugged 
pictures  of  rough  but  true  men."— ff.  Y.  Times  Kevtew. 

The  PrOSpeCtOr.  A  Taleof  the  Crow's  Nest  Pass. 
*55th  Thousand.    12mo,  ...          1.50. 

"A  novel  so  intense  that  one  grinds  his  teeth  less  his 
sinew  should  snap  ere  the  strain  is  released." — 
Chicago  Tribune. 

G Wen.     The  Canyon  story  from  "  The  Sky  Pilot "  In 
Art  Gift  Book  Series,  beautifully  printed  in  two  colors 
with  many  illustrations  and  marginal  etchings. 
tjth  thousand.    12mo,  art  cover,      -         -      net  .75. 

Glengarry  School  Days.  A  story 

days  in  Glengarry. 
Sjth  thousand.  12mo,  Illustrated,  Cloth,  -  1.25. 
"Gets  a  swing  of  incident  and  danger  that  keep  you 
tearing  away  at  the  pages  till  the  book  is  done."— 
N.  Y.Mail. 

The  Man  from  Glengarry.   ATaieof 

the  Ottawa,    azoth  thousand.    12mo,  Cloth,    -     1.50 


Literary  Digest. 

The  Sky  Pilot.  A  TaleoftheFoothills.  Illus- 
trated by  Louis  Rhead. 

Sioth  thousand.    12mo,  Cloth,  -          *          1.20. 

"Ralph  Connor's  'Black  Rock'  was  good, but  'The 
Sky  Pilot'  is  better.  The  matter  which  he  gives  us  is 
real  life ;  virile,  true,  tender,  humorous,  pathetic,  spiri- 
tual, wholesome." — The  Outlook. 

Black  Rock.  ATaleoftheSelkirks.  Introduction 
by  George  Adam  Smith.  Illustrated  by  Louis  Rhead. 
350th  thousand.  12mo,  Cloth,  -  -  1.25. 

"  Ralph  Connor  has  gone  into  the  heart  of  the  North- 
west Canadian  mountains  and  has  painted  for  us  a 
picture  of  life  in  the  lumber  and  mining-camps  of  sur- 
passing merit."— St.  Louis  Globe  Democrat. 


The  Works  of 

NORMAN  DUNCAN 


The  Adventures  of 
Billy  Topsail 

i^th  thousand,  12mo,  Illustrated,  -  1.50. 
It's  a  boy's  book,  but  it's  "a  book  to  be 
chummy  with" — that  includes  everybody. 
"A  marvelously  vivid  and  realistic  narrative. 
There  was  no  need  to  invent  conditions  or 
imagine  situations.  It  is  this  skill  in  por- 
traying actual  conditions  in  Newfoundland 
that  makes  Mr.  Duncan's  work  so  wonder- 
ful."—Brooklyn  Eagle. 

Doctor  Luke  of  the  Labrador 

30th  thousand.  12mo,  Cloth,  -  1.50. 
"  Norman  Duncan  has  fulfilled  all  that  was 
expected  of  him  in  this  story ;  it  established 
him  beyond  question  as  one  of  the  strong  mas- 
ters of  the  present  day." — Brooklyn  Eagle. 

Dr.  Grenfell's  Parish 

Fifth  Edition.  Illustrated,  Cloth,  net  1.00. 
"  He  tells  vividly  and  picturesquely  many  of 
the  things  done  by  Dr.  Grenf ell  and  his  as- 
sociates."—^^ Y.  Sun. 

The  Mother 

A  Novelette  of  New  York  Life. 

Second  Edition.    12mo,  Cloth,       •        1.25. 

de  Luxe, net  2.00. 

"Another  book  quite  unlike  'Dr.  Luke'  in 
environment,  but  very  like  it  in  its  intuitive 
understandings  of  the  natures  of  the  lowly 
and  obscure  .  .  .  holds  the  reader  spell- 
bound."— Nashville  American. 


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